A Dark Day for the Constitution: American Killed By Drone Strike

After months of speculation, the U.S military has killed an American-born cleric in what is probably the clearest indication that the U.S Constitution has been set aside for another (ever-evolving) piece of paper called the Authorized Use of Military Force (AUMF). Now the military has truly become judge, jury and executioner, with the full blessing of the White House and the other branches of government behind it.

According to the most recent reports, Anwar al-Awlaki, who was born in New Mexico, and has preached in American mosques and was allegedly a spiritual inspiration to the Fort Hood Shooter and the unsuccessful Underwear Bomber, was killed in a U.S-led airstrike in Yemen. Story here:

The U.S government has spent the last year trying to convince us that it was legal to target an American citizen for termination because he was a “terrorist” and “key al Qaeda leader,” though it never bothered to give us the evidence because of course, any intelligence it had on Awlaki was “classified” and we just had to take their word for it. Plenty of smart people are pointing out today that Awlaki was hardly a significant operational threat, much less the new Osama bin Laden — though the White House was trying so hard to make him OBL’s replacement.

So now the U.S government has gone from blowing up from the sky any foreigner it deems a threat to national security (and anyone unlucky to be next to him at the time), to picking off American citizens with the same impunity. A foreboding moment, seeing that Awlaki’s assassination comes the same month we’re told the military is working on pilotless, automatic killer drones, and amid growing reports that American police and border patrol agents are routinely using surveillance drones for law enforcement here in the United States. Scarier still, is that by public accounts, Awlaki was targeted for what he said, not what he did. He was an extremist and a propagandist in a war that has been just as much about moving hearts and minds as it has about tearing into flesh and imprisoning the enemy. Crazy people might have listened to him and acted on their own impulses — much like Anders Behring Breivik liked to listen to American Islamophobe propagandists Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller before he went out and killed 76 people in Norway — but we have yet to hear any evidence that he picked up a gun or planted an IED or even plotted a successful attack against the United States. Judge, jury and executioner — it doesn’t matter much to Awlaki now, but we deserve to hear the proof.

Good thing for Geller and Spencer the Norwegians don’t have their own AUMF. Sadly, our AUMF has taken on a life of its own, and will unlikely be stopped before turning its voracious sights right back home.

44 Responses to A Dark Day for the Constitution: American Killed By Drone Strike

There are a number of really depressing aspects about all of this. First, as Kelley notes, al-Awlaki was placed on a secret termination list based on evidence that has never been produced publicly, suggesting that the government did not have a solid case against him. That should alarm anyone who cares about the Bill of Rights. Second, as Kelley also notes, he appears to have been condemned because of what he might have said, not necessarily because of what he had done. One might also add that the two terrorist attacks he has been linked to, Major Hassan and the underwear bomber, were both RETALIATORY in that the US had drone attacked targets in Yemen in the days preceding, killing a number of men, women, and children. Finally, the reports indicate that al-Awlaki was traveling in a convoy of two cars and that both were destroyed. How many other people were killed in the process? I am not attempting to justify al-Awlaki in any way, but doesn’t allowing the government to kill American citizens and others without any apparent due process cross a line that should never have been crossed? Where is the outrage?

An incitement to murder is tantamount to murder, and if U.S. police have the freedom and in fact the responsibility to kill someone attempting to commit murder if he can’t be captured without loss of life, why shouldn’t U.S. armed forces kill al-Awlaki?

Judge, jury and executioner — it doesn’t matter much to Awlaki now, but we deserve to hear the proof.

A dark day indeed. The proof would be nice to have, but it doesn’t matter much for us either. He may well be guilty and he may well have done worse things than even the government has accused him of doing. If we saw the proof, we may instantly agree that such a man deserved to die. Yet laws must protect even the worst of us or they will not help even the best of us. Therefore the rights of citizenship ought to be held as sacred. I almost fear that if the proof were given, then people would all the more quickly forget what innocent until proven guilty really should mean in practice.

It’s time we employ the “R” word, renegade. How much does one have to do before we accept that a citizen has officially and with malice turned coat and become an enemy? He was our sworn adversary and we killed him. All this legalistic niggling gets tiresome. This character is not some guy down the block who moved overseas and had some ideological, social differences with our government. He actively conspired to kill American citizens. As to due process, perhaps if he was willing to present himself before some magistrate as an american citizen for an airing of his case that could have been addressed. He did not. He did everything in his power to reject any trace of allegiance he ever had to the rest of us.

I am no fan of our idiotic wars in the Middle East, but we do have Jihadist enemies actively attacking us and killing a few now and then is unobjectionable in my view.

This person was born in the USA and his whole career should be an object lesson to us about the extreme folly of admitting Muslims within our borders. It’s time to end birthright citizenship now.

Ken’s comment here completely exemplifies what’s happened to Americans’ thinking, in which constitutional rights and legal processes are happily thrown away in order to facilitate Rambo-style militarism. Ken, it’s not whether al-Awlaki was a bad guy or not; it’s whether the US government gets to decide that he is and then summarily execute him, with no legal protection for the man. If the government can do that to him, they can do it to you — then again, maybe you’re okay with that.

Cf. Thomas Meehan’s comment as well: constitutional protections and due process are now just “legalistic niggling.” For people like this, the government doesn’t have to take away their rights; these people gladly hand them over.

No. Now that American citizenship doesn’t mean anything to speak of, let’s extend it to the entire world, so it can still mean next to nothing, but mean it universally. The emperor Caracalla did something like that in the 3rd century.

The next line the regime will cross will be the use of a drone to assassinate a US citizen within US borders. This will happen by around 2015 and become routine after that – to the applause of people like Mr. Meehan. War, even idiotic ones, justify anything.

Fascinating special report on Fox News; I’m actually agreeing with Kirsten Powers, the “Democrat”, on this al-Awlaki business. That’s what happens when the “conservative” representatives are neocon nutjobs like Krauthammer and Goldberg. The fascinating part, of course, is after Goldberg completely failed to rebut Powers’ point about how scary this all is, Krauthammer immediately turned to (where else?), Lincoln and the Civil War. Ah, yes, the standard history lesson for why anything we do is never too extreme an action by the president and if only we had a Real Leader (like good ole bloodthirsty Abe!), why we’d kill every terrorist in existence by next Tuesday! Sure, some of them might technically be “Americans”, but, hey, the great Lincoln didn’t let that bother him, I mean come on, people!

Can’t wait for that next NR cover story on Krauthammer, or “Mr. Conservative”, as he’s known to all right-thinking people. (Does he ever take a day off, btw? Sure am sick of him and his omnipresence on Fox)

“growing reports that American police and border patrol agents are routinely using surveillance drones for law enforcement here in the United States”

Just given the nature of the different things I think this, as a practical matter at least, is the bigger deal that people should thus be more concerned about than the relatively few Americans who are gonna go overseas joining some others in conflicts against us and then be zipped by our forces. (Not to minimize the issue involved in the latter, but just speaking relatively here.)

I think it was in the wake of that Ruby Ridge sniper shooting of that guy’s wife and then that terrible Waco raid that Sen. Charles Grassely at some hearing hit it on the head as far as I’m concerned when he said he thought at least some component of the issue involved the creeping militarization of our police forces that’s been going on for some time.

After all, what difference does it make if we make sure the military can’t be turned against us, but the cops are essentially indistinguishable from the military? And did anyone see those cryptic remarks just this last week talking about how New York City apparently now has some *considerable* air and naval forces in its police pocket? And it’s become utterly unremarkable now to see some video of this or that police department rolling out what appear to be only slightly modified (but admittedly smaller) tank-type vehicles.

I wouldn’t want to deprive our cops of every ability they have to protect themselves and ourselves so it’s a very tough issue, but still an issue nevertheless I feel.

You said “He was our sworn adversary and we killed him”. He was this, because the government said he was. They have provided no proof, just that we should trust them that they extra judicially killed a citizen, because they said it was OK to do so. Remember Ruby Ridge or Waco?? In those cases the government “knew” they were dealing with bad guys, so they went ahead and killed them.

Maybe he did do all of the things they said, or maybe worse, but until they put that evidence into the public arena, convince a jury pof his peers that it is so, he if only an “accesed” terrorist or traitor. That is an important distinct, and the more we take the attitude that killing citizens is OK, because the government says so, the less the Constitution will mean.

It seems all those conservatives that normally wrap themselves in the flag as they wave the constitution are now wearing a white sheet and waving a noose. Meanwhile, all of the caring liberals that were so concerned when the last imperial president was wiretapping without warrants and detaining suspects without trials are now busy organizing fundraisers for the current imperial president as the crickets chirp.

Let’s just hope the regime is lying about al-Awlaki’s influence among American radical Muslims. If one of his disciples is so much as caught riding on a bus with a pack of sparklers, the imperial president is likely to declare martial law.

A “Dark day for the Constitution.” What Constitution? The American Constitution,especially The Bill Of Rights,died years ago. What we have today is a Constitution that has been so over interpreted and twisted around that it’s original intent has been lost to history and is meaningless. In today’s world we do not live in a nation of laws but a nation of very powerful men. These behind the scenes powerful elites control the American Empire that has superseded our Constitutional Republic. Empires need enemies to justify their existence. Today the enemy of choice is terrorist “Islamofascism.” What does a scrap of paper like the U.S.Constitution have to do with anything?

Benjamin Netanyahu said in 1995, in a book on counter-terrorism, that we had to give up our Constitutional rights to be successful against terrrorists, identifying the rights we need to give up as the First Amendment, the Second Amendment, as well as the others. And he identified domestic U.S. terrorists as gun control opponents and other so-called conservatives who (sometimes) insist that the Constitution is to have meaning. Conservatives should have been careful what they asked for of Bush but it’s too late for that now; you reap what you sow.

The poster trying to compare this to the powers of the police is a bit off. Yes, a police officer can shoot someone if that person is immediately about to harm/kill someone else ie., is pointing a gun at the police or another person. However, to put it in perspective, if the police are in a man hunt for a serial killer, and have belief he will go on to kill others, they cannot just shoot to kill when they encounter him. They have to capture and arrest him to face due process. No matter what trail of evidence they have found pointing to the guy’s guilt, they are not judge, jury and executioner. They are to afford him his constitutional right to a trial.

Citizenship is not a factor. The 5th Amendment says “No person … shall be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process.” that means the U.S. could not kill the Japanese pilots who were bombing Pearl Harbor. The founders sensibly made an exception in cases arising in the “land or naval forces .. in time of war or public danger.” That’s now. There is no constitutional problem with killing al-Awlaki.

I think we are living in the darkest of times as Americans. These are very dangerous times. These are Orwellian times. I would like to know what al-Awlaki said that warrants his assassination without any due process. It was most likely critical of our foreign policy. Probably calling for the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq and Afghanistan and an end to our incestuous relationship with Israel. It probably called for an end of US propping up dictators in the Muslim world so we can get sweetheart deals for our oil giants. It probably called for a return of land from the zionists to the Palestinians.

If what I have said is true then a number of Americans “residing on American soil” could be targeted for assassination as well just for being critical of American foreign policy. Now I understand that al-Awlaki probably went a step further than Noam Chomsky or Ron Paul usually do in his criticism of foreign policy he probably did call Muslims to armed action. In fact knowing Wahhabists and their tendency to go call for armed action at the slightest provocation I can pretty much tell you he called for armed action.

Is calling for armed action against the US Government the red line that Americans cannot cross? I suppose it is illegal and is not protected by the constitution or is it? At the same time with the way the Federal Government respects the constitution nowadays is anything other than public displays of homosexuality protected under the constitution?

I wonder if I would be in danger if I called on all Orthodox Christians to rise up against the NATO occupation of Serbian border crossings in northern Kosovo where reports have been coming out that NATO troops have been using live ammunition
against protesting Serbs in NATO’s shameful backing of the KLA gangster government in Pristina (the government they put in place when they stole Kosovo from Serbia). I may loathe Wahhabists like al-Awlaki and their ilk but when it comes to the crimes of the West that have been committed against Muslim lands I completely understand because they have committed those crimes against Holy Orthodox Serbia as well (ironically at behest of the Muslim Bosniaks and Albanians) as well as egging on that nutjob Sakashvilli to start a war with Russia over South Ossetia and Abkhazia where fraternal Orthodox blood was shed because of Washington’s desire to build an oil pipeline through the region. I understand al-Awlaki’s anger and I feel it run through my veins when I think of the Serbs who were ethnically cleansed from Krajina (in Croatia) with the help of CIA managed Blackwater type firms who helped the Croatian fascists purge the Serbian Orthodox Christians from their lands. I feel it run from my veins as I watch videos of Albanians vandalizing and then burning a centuries old Orthodox Church while the NATO forces that helped them claim the country just look on. Yes I feel the anger and I understand it even if there are many battlefields in this world where al-Awlaki and I are enemies for when it comes to fighting the Wahhabist/Salafists no one has been on the front line over the past two decades than Orthodox Christians except for maybe the Shia (but that’s another story)

As for the legality of drone strikes targeting American citizens.
What about the legality of ten thousand disturbing actions the US government has taken in the past 20 years alone with us the US citizenry only maybe knowing 50% of those actions if that. This is just another in a long line of disturbing actions, but it makes sense that one day the US government would run out of enemies abroad and start chasing enemies at home using the same kill on sight methods.

“Is calling for armed action against the US Government the red line that Americans cannot cross? I suppose it is illegal and is not protected by the constitution or is it?”

Hi Dimitry:

I don’t know for absolute sure but I’d bet a whole lot that indeed calling for the violent overthrow of the U.S. government is indeed a crime. Despite it’s *seeming* relevance here however I don’t think, constitutionally speaking, that it is at all.

If it was, for instance, then indeed that guy accused of doing so and killed would have been entitled not just to “due process” but to a lawyer, a trial by jury, and etc., etc., right? So do you really think any court is going to so hold?

While I’m sympathetic to the calls about how there was no evidence produced that this man was indeed a terrorist and etc., and while I hate to say it given that people I admire (such as Kelley Vlahos) just seem to wrongly assume and say it otherwise, I don’t think there was any constitutional “problem” here whatsoever.

That’s because they are not taking into account that certainly Obama asserts as his authority for doing what he did that he was acting under the War Powers of the Constitution, and not just as the “Executive” in normal times seeing that criminals get prosecuted.

And given all the Congressional Resolutions and etc. that have been passed with this “war on terror” business there really can’t be a speck of doubt that indeed Congress has declared that we are indeed at war. (With no formal *form* of such declarations ever having been required historically, and this being recognized by the S. Ct long ago.)

So there you have the Prez., as Commander-in-Chief already, as he *always* is, and already having at least *some* powers when it comes to people he sees as intending war on the U.S. all on his own, coupled with all the immense constitutional authority given to *Congress* to *formally* (in any way it wishes) to recognize war, war-like hostilities, war-like enemies, and etc., all further amping up Obama’s powers here.

No way, in my opinion, is any lawsuit against Obama/the U.S. here going to succeed on the basis that Obama didn’t have authority to do what he did. And even if it turned out that the man killed was *not* a terrorist and while he was nevertheless targeted anyway, well, I don’t think it would be held that the Constitution requires the War Powers to be executed without mistakes being made.

Not pretty to some/many, and just my take on things legally, but there it is.

While understandable, just … wrongheaded to go about slamming this on constitutional ground I think. And meaningless; it ain’t gonna move this S. Ct. or any future one given the long and strong precedents in the field. And when it comes to anything dealing with foreign affairs/matters of war anyway that Court is historically deferential as hell to the gov’t regarding almost any powers it claims.

(And think about the War Power: Not only was it given during perilous times for this country when of course it was thought that our government might have to take all kinds of actions to survive, but its logic is that the power to wage war is presumably the power to do whatever it takes to win wars too. And then think of the fact that the Founders also even considered the question of Rebellions inside the U.S., and didn’t go cutting the War Power there even much.)

No, people should concentrate their fire about this thing on other non-constitutional grounds in my opinion. Esp. the amorphous declaring of a war on a mere tactic. Now *that’s* scary to me. Again here too I don’t think the S. Ct. would ever gainsay the Pres or Congress declaring war on anything, including “Great Pumpkin threats,” but that doesn’t mean the public has to like the idea of the government being able to invoke all the awesome powers is has in waging war by declaring any vague word it wants as the enemy. Indeed, the public should not only not like it, they ought to be scared to death of it.

‘Now that American citizenship doesn’t mean anything to speak of, let’s extend it to the entire world, so it can still mean next to nothing, but mean it universally”

In a sense, you have the causality reversed. In 1924 our leaders wisely adopted an immigration policy that recognized that culture , and yes race too, was important. Consequently, lines were drawn which effectively eliminated large scale Muslim immigration. 1965 we adopted an immigration policy which, intentionally or not, favors to those from cultures most unlike our own historical nation. Hasan and Awlaki are the products of that immigration policy. For a technical view (and technicalities are important) they are Americans. Yet I, and I suspect many Americans feel absolutely no common ground with them. And from their actions, it is evident they they had no common ground with the peoples that have historically made up America. Most Americans can and will ignore blatantly illegal actions by our government against people who are Americans only in a technical sense, who have no link to our historical nation.

Unfortunately, this acquiescence against technically American citizens will only encourage government to act against culturally, historically American people.

Obama has been using drones for a while now. I do not think he is doing this because he is sinking in the polls. He is doing it a lot more so maybe it is because of the polls. He wants to win to the max. but his record is terrible, he probably cannot win. He has done so much damage to the country the people cannot change their mind on him. He is toast. It is too late to save him in the next election.

@Bob Ward
that means the U.S. could not kill the Japanese pilots who were bombing Pearl Harbor. The founders sensibly made an exception in cases arising in the “land or naval forces .. in time of war or public danger.” That’s now. There is no constitutional problem with killing al-Awlaki.

This line of reasoning can be found all over neo-con sites like National Review. How anyone can see a resemblance between Pearl Harbor and al-Awlaki is beyond me. al-Awlaki was NOT on a battlefield. Nor was he attacking the United States. Nor was he engaged in any behavior — at the time — that could be remotely construed as a public danger to the United States. If any past behavior by al-Awlaki did, in fact, constitute a public danger to the United States, it should have been relatively straightforward to pursue a legal process. It has been, after all, over a year since the US Government declared him KOS. Any so-called imminent threat to the US by al-Awlaki’s existence was grossly exaggerated. What threat did he pose — at the time of the assassination? Who was he threatening — at the time of the assassination?

We are not at war with Yemen — at least not by any civilized meaning of the term “at war.” It is now expected by many that the magic incantation of “War on Terror” is supposed to end all reasonable discussion about anything and everything.

By what process did al-Awlaki get on the To Be Assassinated List? There are still — fortunately — a few people in America that question the power of the despot to put a name on such a list. What would stop Obama from putting Bob Ward on that list? The US Government lies about everything. It is amazing that people who would never take a government report on CPI or Unemployment rates at face value will swallow a government statement that Soandso is a terrorist without question.

Today, Dick Cheney asserted that the Obama administration is merely following his and Bush’s policies. I agree with that. He thinks that is a good thing. I don’t.

The genie is out of the bottle. The Constitution is a dead letter. Congress has abdicated its responsibilities, and the courts have been complicit in the executive’s egregious overreaching, dismissing meritorious lawsuits by innocent victims of, among other things, the unlawful rendition program, on the fallacious ground that to allow them to continue would compromise national security.

Has anyone in Congress or the MSM even questioned the process that gets someone on the “Kill List”? Both institutions rolled over when the administration stonewalled about reporting to Congress about the use of military force against Libya, arguing that American forces were not engaged in hostilities because they were never in danger. I suppose that would be true in every drone attack. Therefore, there need never be any accountability.

Amid all the handwringing let’s try something constructive. The Government kills people all the time. But the government is rightfully constrained by due process. The present problem is how to deal with an “American” who adheres a self proclaimed enemy organization. Such perope who will not submit to a formal trial or hearing will never submit to due process as you envision it.

A process wherein a Court appointed adversary and an advocate can appear before a magistrate and come to a rational legal decision is the obvious course of action. I’ve heard that something similar did happen somewhere in the Obama administration. But exactly how this operated, I’m not sure.

An alternative is to have a similar entity determine if an individual took up arms against us. If so, a termination of citizenship should not be beyond the whit of man.

Frank. (ME) He was our sworn adversary and we killed him. (FRANK) “He was this, because the government said he was.” No Frank, he was because HE said he was. Tape recordings, press releases, sermons etc., all authored by him all proclaiming war on the rest of us is not hearsay evidence.

I don’t think that we can say that our government has gone rogue because it is willing to kill people like bin Laden or al-Awlaki. I think we should say that it has gone rogue because it has shown itself willing to sacrifice thousands of American servicemen in wars that have nothing to do with our national defense and which have burdened our country with unnecessary debt and sown the seeds of future wars, quite possibly wars that will be fought on our own soil.

But it doesn’t have to be like this. The constitution is not a dead letter unless the American people believe it to be or want it to be. Perhaps it is a dead letter to a government that has, in many important ways, abandoned the rule of law, but the people still have something to say about it. Governments always try to subvert the rule of law because, for them, it is an inconvenience. Governments always hide behind “national security” and abuse official secrecy as tools to expand their power at our expense. But these things can only happen if the American people allow them to happen.

Excellent analysis, Ms. Vlahos. These are exceedingly dark times for those who love liberty. Even more distressing than the government’s tyrannical actions in this matter is widespread public approbation of those actions. Obama’s applauders—and they’re coming from both poles of the political duopoly—must think themselves somehow safe from inclusion on the Lord High Executioner’s “little list.” They are mistaken. They applaud the destruction of their own rights.

@Thomas O. Meehan, Bob Ward, and other authoritarians

Speech, however hateful, is not a crime—let alone a capital one. No solid evidence that Awlaki planned or participated in any given attack has ever been adduced. His alleged links to Al Qaeda remain unproved. His “crime”—or the only one which is public knowledge—was speech. And for this he was killed—without the barest pretense of due process, not even a trial in absentia. (Any rumors of secret hearings you may have heard hardly count; for justice is not done in the dark.)

By the slightest extension of your “logic,” then, any domestic “extremist” who expresses hatred of the regime in Washington may be summarily terminated. And any self-proclaimed domestic “enemy of the state” is liable to expeditious liquidation, especially if it is *asserted* by the *state* that such a citizen-enemy would never “submit . . . to due process as you envision it”—or if apprehending said enemy is simply regarded as too dangerous, expensive or bothersome a course. Indeed, so far as we know, no serious attempt was made to apprehend Awlaki—either by the US or by the US’s brutal pet regime in Sanaa. Further, it is doubtful that apprehending him was ever seriously considered at all; for no charges were ever brought against him and no formal arrest process initiated.

No matter how many bad analogies one makes, comparing Awlaki to Pearl Harbor or to a street thug caught in the act of firing a pistol at innocents, no matter how much one sniffs at “legalistic niggling,” and no matter how many tortured readings one applies to the Constitution’s pellucid guarantees of due process, the upshot of the Awlaki assassination is plain: an American citizen, charged with no crime, was openly killed by executive order. The courts looked the other way, the mob cheered, and the tattered Constitution was at last rent and stomped into the muck. It does not matter that Awlaki was an unsympathetic character; the rule of law, if it exists at all, must be absolute, and sinners and saints must be weighed in the same balance. But now the rule of law is dead; the republic is dead; and we are no longer in any meaningful sense free. God help us all!

hi – while a controversial subject , a question regarding your aritcle – how do you distinguish between an american citizen and one who
isn’t on the battlefield when bullets are flying and we are fighting the
enemy – if this man was (and all seem to agree) truly trying to
fight against america and he is taken out, what is the difference
between taking him out and colonists taken out who took the
british side or southerners who opposed the north and to do so
without a trial ? tks for time – dan stanley

Let’s not forget the murder of the innocent men, women and children in Waco Texas, by Janet Reno and her boss, Bill Clinton. These people did not even speak against the government. Our “government” can kill any one of us now…..